New Insulin and checking blood glucose?

[Nix_101]

Hello, I have diabetes type 1 and am newly diagnosed just before christmas 2013
I suffer from bad anxiety and find social situation awful to deal with and have panic attacks so having to go to hospital and doctors and everything else has been really hard for me to do. When I was first told I was diabetic i was asked to go to the hospitals diabetes center which is a big center with lots of specialist nurse and looked good but with my anxiety I found it hard to get to it so my nurse put me on novomix 30 insulin pens 8 units twice daily and then transferred me to a closer clinic that wasn't as nice as the hospitals one but was within walking distance from my home.
My old nurse said that the insulin I was on was 'starter' insulin and wanted to get me off it asap and said she asked the new nurse to change it for me. I attended my new clinic today and the nurse was nice enough and took bloods to do a diabetes hba1c and it came 8% which she told me wasn't to bad. We talked for a while and she didn't seem like she was intending on changing my insulin even though that was the reason I was told to attend there and I said numerous times that my other nurse didn't want me on the pens I was using at that moment being the novomix 30 as this was my 'starter' pens and it didn't suit my lifestyle. After a little while she finally agreed and has now put me on 2 different insulins being levemir 6 units and novorapid 2 units with a meal. I found it quite strange I had to almost demand to be switched to another insulin even though my old nurse had said numerous times that my old pens where just for the first few week and where the best type of insulin to be on regularly. She said a few times that they were used to dealing with type 2s there mostly and it was rare to have a type 1 in their center. Another thing I also found strange was she asked how many times I checked my blood daily and I said if it had been high I would check it 6 times a day tops and she pulled a face like this was way to many and then told me to just check it once in the morning and then once before i go to sleep which I found a bit stupid to be honest as how would I know if I was to low or high throughout the day or if I was having a hypo to drink/eat something to raise my sugar levels? Also when diagnosed I was told to check it before I ate meals and did injections so i know not to inject to much. I wanted to know was I right to almost have to demand to get new different insulin? Also how many times should I be checking my blood averagely how many times would you check yours or where told to check yours? Would I be better going back to the original hospital clinic instead as they seem to know what there doing? Any advice welcome.
Thanks

 

[mrman]

Go back to the other one, should be testing at least before all meals , twice a day, definately not enough, even though you are on basal/Bolus, quick and long acting insulin sound like you are on fixed doses. to go forward you need to carb count, and learn to adjust what you inject depending how many carbs your eating. Would start by testing first thing in the morning, before breakfast/lunch/tea, 2 hours after eating and before bed. Record everything, time of test, levels, what you ate, any excercise. you can download a record chart on.web. Take the info to your old clinic and they will help interperate the results, give advice etc and. Ask about a dafne course .

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[michaeldavid]

Hello Nix_101,

I can't advise on the insulin. But I can say that I effectively designed my own insulin regimen. (See my profile.) And the key for me is to keep everything as simple as possible. Most crucially, I don't take any significant amount of long-acting insulin; so I can ensure that I have the bare minimum of insulin operating within me overnight. So I sleep safely.

As for testing, I would urge that you test as often as you like. That's what I do.

But mostly I use the simple and highly economical visually read strips: either Betachek Visual or Glucoflex-R. ( http://www.betachek.com/uk/)

One's blood sugar needs to be fairly well controlled to make best use of them. (Each strip can be cut with scissors; and the cost per test is as little as 1/20th of the cost per test using a meter.) I find that the readings they give are not very precise for anything over 8mmol/l. But for low readings especially, I find them to be very precise and accurate.

 

[Daibell]

First, Levemir and Novorapid are very popular insulins for Basal/Bolus so I wouldn't rush to change away from them. As Brett says you will need to set the Basal units right by targeting between 5-7 mmol in the morning and adjusting by only a unit every few days if needed and doing blood sugar checks to avoid hypos. Seek DN guidance where you can. Yes, you should learn to carb count which is dead easy and will enable you to match the rapid insulin units to what you eat at each meal. People test in widely varying amounts. Typically I will test once or twice day; sometimes more. Others will test much more. A lot depends on how predictable you are each day and how often you drive.

 

[michaeldavid]

Levemir and Novorapid may well be "very popular insulins for Basal/Bolus",

However the whole point of a basal/bolus insulin regimen is to facilitate so-called 'normal eating': ie. the following of a meal-based diet, just like anyone who is not diabetic.

But you do not need to aim to eat normally (as though you weren't really diabetic), if you don't want to. I don't, just because I am not normal: I'm diabetic.

So instead, I always take the same insulin each day. (Indeed I find that I only very rarely need to make adjustments.) And I 'feed' that insulin - testing my blood sugar as I go - throughout the day.

I never need to 'count carbs'.

And my past three HbA1C readings were 27mmol/mol.